Methadone was a better alternative to weak powder heroin, which was more expensive and available only in dangerous housing projects or skid rows. But maintaining large numbers of people on any kind of opiate, particularly on low doses, made them easy prey for someone with a more efficient and convenient opiate delivery system. For years, though, no one could conceive of such a thing: a system of retailing street heroin that was cheaper than, as safe as, and more convenient than a methadone clinic. But in the mid-1990s, that’s exactly what the Xalisco Boys brought to towns across America. They
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